This was very interesting today.

aw 

Solar Energy - The Sun is huge in comparison to Earth. Can barely see Earth when comparative sizes are used. We could fill the lit surface of the moon with solar panels and the astronauts would have something visibly useful to do in space: setting up the solar panels, collecting the batteries, and/or building an infrastructure to transmit the energy to Earth. Staring at that huge ball of potential energy, it seems incredibly ridiculous and near sighted to not exploit all that free power.

FOR MY SON

I’ve been to London, and Paris and Rome

Washington, New York, and Los Angeles

Champagne, paté, and caviar

And nothing compares

To picking up your toddler at preschool

Running into your arms chanting “mommy, mommy, mommy”

As if the sun and moon have risen together

No memory is dearer 
Nor warms the heart more  

Or the first time he sits up on his own
And promptly falls over

And erupts in joyous peels of laughter

Or the day he finds his toes for the first time

Like a hunter walking up to the edge of a cliff 

or lightly touches your eyelids

With the wonder of an explorer walking through the amazon for the first time

And for those first few years

A mother can hold in her arms

Chubby arms and legs, satin skin, and the most glorious fragrance

Everything that is wonder and joy and newness of spirit

- L. Rosell Oct 2016

Pope Francis's Exhortations

http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/francesco/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20131124_evangelii-gaudium_en.html#III.%26%238194%3BThe_common_good_and_peace_in_society

I invite all Christians, everywhere, at this very moment, to a renewed personal encounter with Jesus Christ, or at least an openness to letting him encounter them; I ask all of you to do this unfailingly each day. No one should think that this invitation is not meant for him or her, since “no one is excluded from the joy brought by the Lord”.[1] The Lord does not disappoint those who take this risk; whenever we take a step towards Jesus, we come to realize that he is already there, waiting for us with open arms. Now is the time to say to Jesus: “Lord, I have let myself be deceived; in a thousand ways I have shunned your love, yet here I am once more, to renew my covenant with you. I need you. Save me once again, Lord, take me once more into your redeeming embrace”. How good it feels to come back to him whenever we are lost! Let me say this once more: God never tires of forgiving us; we are the ones who tire of seeking his mercy. Christ, who told us to forgive one another “seventy times seven” (Mt 18:22) has given us his example...

I find it thrilling to reread this text: “The Lord, your God is in your midst, a warrior who gives you the victory; he will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love; he will exult over you with loud singing, as on a day of festival” (3:17)

This is the joy which we experience daily, amid the little things of life, as a response to the loving invitation of God our Father: “My child, treat yourself well, according to your means… Do not deprive yourself of the day’s enjoyment” (Sir 14:11, 14). What tender paternal love echoes in these words!

5. The Gospel, radiant with the glory of Christ’s cross, constantly invites us to rejoice. A few examples will suffice. “Rejoice!” is the angel’s greeting to Mary (Lk 1:28).  ... Jesus himself “rejoiced in the Holy Spirit” (Lk10:21). His message brings us joy: “I have said these things to you, so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete” (Jn 15:11). Our Christian joy drinks of the wellspring of his brimming heart. He promises his disciples: “You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy” (Jn 16:20). He then goes on to say: “But I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you” (Jn 16:22).  ...

37. Saint Thomas Aquinas taught that the Church’s moral teaching has its own “hierarchy”, in the virtues and in the acts which proceed from them.[39] What counts above all else is “faith working through love” (Gal 5:6). Works of love directed to one’s neighbour are the most perfect external manifestation of the interior grace of the Sprit ...

- Pope Francis

Read more

http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/francesco/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20131124_evangelii-gaudium_en.html#III.%26%238194%3BThe_common_good_and_peace_in_society

"For this is the law and the prophets, Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and your neighbor as yourself."

I like something else he says about not getting caught up in a pleasure seeking culture that ignores the lasting joy found in forgetting oneself in service and community with others, like family, friends and neighbors.

"But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We
refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of
opportunity of this nation. 

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and 

discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to
degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the
majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.  ..

With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a
stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling
discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this
faith ... "

Martin Luther King,  I have a Dream Speach

March on Washington For Jobs and Freedom

Gandhi speeches

http://www.mkgandhi.org/speeches/speechMain.htm

Satyagraha (/ˌsætɪəˈɡrɑːhɑː/; Sanskrit: सत्याग्रह satyāgraha), loosely translated as "insistence on truth" (satya 'truth'; agraha'insistence') or "soul force"^[1] or "truth force," is a particular philosophy and practice within the broader overall category generally known as nonviolent resistance or civil resistance. The term "satyagraha" was coined and developed by Mahatma Gandhi.^[2] He deployed satyagraha in the Indian independence movement and also during his earlier struggles in South Africa for Indian rights. Satyagraha theory influenced Nelson Mandela's struggle in South Africa under apartheid, Martin Luther King, Jr.'s and James Bevel's campaigns during the civil rights movement in the United States, and many other social justice and similar movements.^[3][4] Someone who practices satyagraha is a satyagrahi.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satyagraha

Civil disobedience

Non-violence (ahimsa)

Non-cooperation

Boycotts (swadeshi)

This I Believe

I've been trying to get rid of some of my books, but it's been difficult because each time I open one I find something interesting or beautiful:

I am not going to talk about religious beliefs but about matters so obvious that it has gone out of style to mention them.  I believe in my neighbors.  I know their faults, and I know that there virtues far outweigh their faults. 

Take Father Michael down our road a piece.  I'm not of his creed, but I know that goodness and charity and loving kindness shine in his daily actions.  I believe in father Mike.  If I'm in trouble, I'll go to him. 

My next-door neighbor is a veterinary doctor.  Doc will get out of bed after a hard day to help a stray cat.  No fee - no prospect of  a fee - I believe in Doc. 

I believe in my townspeople.  You can knock on any door in our town saying, "I'm hungry," and you will be fed.  Our town is no exception.  I've found Tge same ready charity everywhere.  But for the one who says, "To heck with you - I've got mine," there are a hundred , a thousand who will say, sure pal, sit down.". .. 

I believe in my fellow citizens.  Our headlines are splashed with crime, yet for every criminal there are 10,000 honest, decent, kindly men [women].  If it were not so, no child would live to grow up.  Business could not go on from day to day.  Decency is not news.  It is buried in the obituaries, but it is a force stronger than crime.  I believe in the patient gallantry of nurses and the tedious sacrifices of teachers.  I believe in the unseen and unending fight against desperate odds that goes on quietly in almost every home in the land. 

I believe in the honest craft of workmen.  Take a look around you.  There never were enough bosses to check up on all that work.  From Independence Hall to the Grand Coulee Dam, these things were built level and square by craftsmen who were honest in their bones.  ... 

And finally, I believe in my whole race.  Yellow, white, black, red, brown.  In the honesty, courage, intelligence, durability, and goodness of the overwhelming majority of my brothers and sisters everywhere on this planet.  I am proud to be a human being.  I believe that we have come this far by the skin of our teeth.  That we always make it just by the skin of our teeth, but tat we will always make it.  Survive.  Endure.  I believe that this hairless embryo with the aching, oversize brain case and the opposable thumb, this animal barely up from the apes, will endure. Will endure longer than his home planet - will spread out to the stars and beyond, carrying with him his honesty and insatiable curiosity, his unlimited courage and his noble essential decency. 

This I believe with all my heart.                    - by Robert A. Heinlein

The Only Way to Respond to Life

 by Leo Babauta at www.zenhabits.com

http://zenhabits.net/applause/

I went for a run along the beach at sunset yesterday,
foam kissing my bare feet,
smooth sand caressing my soles,
and the sky exploding with color.

I paused for breath,
mostly because the sky, and the Pacific, had borrowed my breath from me.
I stopped and applauded.


This morning, wherever you are, whatever life has given you, take a moment to really appreciate this gift...

Then give back to life, something, anything, to show your gratitude for this miracle you’ve been given. Do anything: be kind to someone, create something, be gentle with your children, do something where your body feels full of life.

Action Against Govt. Surveillance in Germany

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/30/opinion/sunday/germans-loved-obama-now-we-dont-trust-him.html?hp&_r=0

Malte Spitz, NyTimes, 063013

Six months of metadata, stored by my cellphone provider, T-Mobile. This list of metadata contained 35,830 records. That’s 35,830 times my phone company knew if, where and when I was surfing the Web, calling or texting.

With these 35,830 pieces of data, you can follow my travels across Germany, you can see when I went to sleep and woke up, a trail further enriched with public information from my social networking sites: six months of my life viewable for everybody to see what exactly is possible with “just metadata.”

All of this data had to be kept so that law enforcement agencies could gain access to it. That meant that the metadata of 80 million Germans was being stored, without any concrete suspicions and without cause.

This “preventive measure” was met with huge opposition in Germany. Lawyers, journalists, doctors, unions and civil liberties activists started to protest. In 2008, almost 35,000 people signed on to a constitutional challenge to the law. In Berlin, tens of thousands of people took to the streets to protest data retention. In the end, the Constitutional Court ruled that the implementation of the European Union directive was, in fact, unconstitutional.

Data Mining Of Personal Info

From Campaign War Room to Big-Data Broom

By MICAH COHEN, nytimes, 061913

By merging voter files with information scoured from the Web, political candidates hope to be able to closely tailor their appeals to each potential supporter. 

The Criminal N.S.A.

By JENNIFER STISA GRANICK and CHRISTOPHER JON SPRIGMAN

Published: June 27, 2013

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/28/opinion/the-criminal-nsa.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Edward J. Snowden, the former N.S.A. contract employee and whistle-blower, has provided evidence that the government has phone record metadata on all Verizon customers, and probably on every American, going back seven years. This metadata is extremely revealing; investigators mining it might be able to infer whether we have an illness or an addiction, what our religious affiliations and political activities are, and so on.

BIG DATA 2013 JUN 19, 9:49 PM

New Ways Marketers Are Manipulating Data to Influence You

By TANZINA VEGA, NyTimes

Information from social media, credit card histories and Web habits helps marketers create advertisements that are increasingly personalized and nuanced. READ MORE…

Ways to Make Your Online Tracks Harder to Follow

By NATASHA SINGER, nytimes

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/19/ways-to-make-your-online-tracks-harder-to-follow-2/?_r=0

There are ways to minimize our digital footprints and at least nominally impede surveillance. READ MORE…

ADDITIONAL OPTIONS
Use a Proxy Server, like Proxify, to make web surfing anonymous
Use a search engine that doesn't track you, like www.duckduckgo.com

MAY 3, 2013, 5:03 PM11 Comments

Do-Not-Track Talks Could Be Running Off the Rails

By NATASHA SINGER

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/03/do-not-track-talks-could-be-running-off-the-rails/

Privacy advocates, for their part, argue that consumers have a right to choose not to be tracked by companies they don’t do business with. If the price consumers have to pay is more generic ads that are not tailored to them, they say, so be it.

“Most people don’t realize the extent to which this brazen online tracking is done, but when the practice is described, they want to be able to control it,” John M. Simpson, the privacy project director at Consumer Watchdog, wrote in a blog post earlier this week. “Why should a company I know nothing about, have no say over and no relationship with be able to collect information about my online activity?”

If the tracking protection group of the World Wide Web Consortium or W3C, the international standards body that has been trying to create a consensus for the privacy mechanisms...

UK asks Google to delete data collected by Street View cars

Kounteya Sinha, TNN | Jun 24, 2013, 05.54 AM IST

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/internet/UK-asks-Google-to-delete-data-collected-by-Street-View-cars/articleshow/20736446.cms?

But while accumulating images in 2010, oneGoogle engineer created a software that could snoop and pull out data from unsecured Wi-Fi networks the car encountered during its drive through towns and cities. The data included personal emails and financial details.

Google later said collecting such data or snooping into emails wasn't part of its programme and it was carried out by the engineer who was acting independently.